Bald
by NeverQuitDreaming
Summary: Written for the "32 Reasons Why We Love" challenge. Andromeda is attempting to write an essay in the Library and there are certain disturbances.


_If I was JK Rowling, I wouldn't be able to bring myself to kill of Fred. _

**For the "32 Reasons Why We Love" Challenge. **

**Quote**_: "To most people loneliness is a doom. Yet loneliness is the very thing which God has chosen to be one of the schools of training for His very own. It is the fire that sheds the dross and reveals the gold."-Bernard M. Martin_

_Edited as of December 2011_

Bald

By: Never Quit Dreaming

Andromeda Black flinched at the sound of boisterous laughter, her quill ripping through an hour's amount of work, leaving splotches of black ink in its wake. She closed her eyes, counting backwards from twenty, trying to block out the urge to curse every single one of those bleeding Hufflepuffs, until they no longer had the ability to even emit any type of sound.

Viciously, she grabbed yet another sheet of parchment paper (her sixth), slammed it down on the table, and began rewriting the first paragraph to her 16th inch paper on the properties and uses of Billywig Stings. She had been counting on having this small back corner of the Library to herself.

Andromeda rarely thought about any matters typical of being a sixteen year old witch. Her mother, the grand Druella Black, planned and controlled every aspect of her daughters' lives. After Hogwarts, Andromeda would immediately marry a pureblood (preferably the eldest, brutish Lestrange brother) that has been deemed worthy of an alliance, raise proper, pureblood children, and host lovely, fancy, pureblood functions. Working for a little while out of Hogwarts was out of the question. Living for a bit in a flat with a mate was laughable. She would live up to her expectations. There were no other options.

She realized she was trapped years ago. Hopelessly doomed to that cookie cutter shaped life, without any way to escape. She tells herself that she's accepted it, but sometimes, it feels like she can't breath, smothered by her mother's satisfied little smirk, and hushed orders (_sit up straight, smile at handsome Rabastian, Don't get to friendly with so-and-so, remember they are only halfbloods _...), so much so that occasionally, she just has to run away from it all, give herself room to think with no one whispering in her ear. She confides in no one, (Bella_ wouldn't understand now, Sissy is too young_) and feels rather lonely and estranged at times. She read once, out of some muggle book she found on her table in the Library one day, and quickly put down after realizing what it was, that "To most people loneliness is a doom. Yet loneliness is... the fire that sheds the dross and reveals the gold." She isn't so sure if she agrees with that statement.

But whatever it is, it keeps her sane, proof that she's not completely brainwashed yet.

No, what worries Andromeda, is Bella's cryptic little clues at where's she has gone off to recently, insinuating that something big will happen. What worries her, is watching little Sirius stand there numbly, as her _loving_ Aunt teaches him invaluable lessons on being the Black Family Heir. Lessons that sometimes end with Andromeda tending to a bruised and battered Sirius secretly afterwards. What worries her, is hearing the constant not-so-subtle hints about her future husband.

The table across from her sniggered loudly again, but thankfully this time it didn't cause her to mess up once more. She'd been expecting it. Tucking a stray strand of her dark brown hair behind her ear, she raised her eyebrows and glared at them. A boy with dark blonde hair, which always flopped in his eyes, caught her gaze for a moment and held it, a wide grin spreading on his face. Confused as to why he smiled, she narrowed her dark brown eyes more, pursing her lips.

The boy lifted an eyebrow and then winked at her before returning back to his rather loud conversation. Andromeda froze. He winked at her. _Winked _at _her_! He must be deluded, some type of hopelessly dense bloke. Why on Salazar Slytherin's name would he have winked! A Hufflepuff, winking at a Slytherin! Biting her lip to repress the angry stream of expletives and threats, she sat a little straighter and turned her attention back to the paper that was in dire need of being finished.

There was no way she could think of enough sentences to fill up 10 more inches. Sighing, she got up from her table, and meandered over to the bookshelves, in search of anything on Billywig Stings. The hair on the back of her neck rose, as she ran her pointer finger along the old, dust covered spines, and a rather uneasy feeling filled the pit of her stomach. Suddenly, the Library fell utterly silent. Turning around warily, Andromeda spotted the boys of the Hufflepuff table staring at her, frozen, with wide, frightened eyes. Quickly glancing down at her clothing, to make sure none was amiss, the oddest thing happened. She felt the cool air on her scalp. Slowly, she reached up to feel her hair, her long, wavy, dark brown hair, and instead, felt cold skin.

It was gone. Her hair, gone. She was bald. _Bald. _

_Some, poor, unlucky fool will die. Painfully._

She found the end of her wand, sticking out of the pocket in her jacket, and smiled as she pictured all the different ways she could begin. She could start with incarcerous, tie him up to make him unable to struggle, then hit the perpetrator with several unpleasant spells, funculous, flagrate to name a few, and then, if she still felt angry, maybe she'd end with a bang, perhaps the entrail expelling curse, one she isn't to familiar with, but very excited to try. She surveyed the room, searching for a guilty expression. Her eyes landed on the Hufflepuff table, and noted how they all stiffened, and their eyes seemed to flick toward the boy who winked at her. To his credit, he met her gaze, and didn't flinch when she pulled out her wand, and tapped it casually on her thigh. Nodding at his mates, he stood up, and made his way over to her.

She cocked her head to the side, waiting for some type of explanation. He shifted uncomfortably.

"It was an accident. See, I meant to hit that one over there," He pointed to the boy sitting across from his empty chair, who wiggled his fingers at them, "But the little bugger moved out of the way just in time, and it got you instead. Quick reflexes, that one." The tall, floppy haired boy smiled to himself. "If its any consolation though, with or without hair, you're a very attractive bird." His grin widened, and Andromeda supposed that most girls would have thought he was charming. She scowled, shifting slightly to block others view of them. With a vicious smile, she raised her wand and pointed it at this chest.

"Tell me how to replace my hair immediately, and I won't curse you until you're a meaningless lump of burned flesh." She said calmly. His grin faltered for a moment, glancing down at her wand.

"Burned lump of flesh, you say?" His voice raised an octave higher, and the bald girl pressed the tip of her wand hard into his chest. "Rightio, then!" Pulling out his own wand, he quickly performed a series of quick, complicated, jabs and twists, and then, slowly, she felt an odd itching sensation from her scalp, as her hair rapidly began growing back. "That long?" He asked, as it fell midway down her back. She nodded sharply, and quickly turned on her heel, picking up a random book from the shelf, going back to her table, lacking the energy for a nice duel. The book dropped on the wood with a low pitched thud, and she sat down stoic, back perfectly straight, and began twisting her long brown hair into a complicated knot she learned from her mother. One of the only useful things she had learned from dear Druella.

As she opened the cover from her book, "101 Different Household Spells," in the pathetic attempt to find any other information on Billywig Stings, she noticed a long shadow falling across her table. Glancing up, she discovered the source and nearly groaned.

"What?" She said rather waspishly.

"I am honestly, very sorry about the whole, making you bald, thing, Andromeda." He ducked his head, smiling apologetically. She started to make some sort of retort, but then a sudden thought hit her.

"How do you know my name?" The quill she'd been holding slipped from her fingers.

"We have been in the same classes for the past six years. I actually sat behind you last year in History of Magic. Do you seriously not know mine? I'm Ted, Ted Tonks, sound familiar to you at all? No? Now I just feel stupid." His face flushed, and he ran his hand through his hair.

"Sorry. I sort of recognized you, but I'm not at all..." She trailed off, flapping her hand helplessly in the air, surprised by the twinge of guilt she felt at the bottom of her stomach. An awkward tension filled the space between them, with Andromeda still trying to find words and Ted looking as if his sole desire was to be _anywhere_ _else_ at this present moment.

"Merlin! How many rolls of parchment have you used?" He gestured at the pile of ripped, ink-stained remnants of her past tries at writing the paper. The cheery tone of his voice made her cringe.

"Six rolls." She paused and then it was as if those two words sparked the rest of her anger, breaking her composure completely, and she began ranting, unable to stop. "Six bloody rolls of parchment! You know why? Because you and your pack of Neanderthal buffoons cannot comprehend the idea of Libraries being places of silence! A place of peace! No! It appears the thought never entered you small undeveloped minds! So instead every couple of minutes you interrupt with your effing laughter!" A long pause settled in between them, as Andromeda glared back down at the pointless, unhelpful book she picked, hands clenched tightly underneath the table.

Then, the right corner of Ted's mouth lifted, and his eyes got a certain playful twinkle. "If you don't mind me asking, your Highness, why didn't you just spell your parchment fixed? Surely that would have been easier. You do remember that you are a witch, right?" He chuckled good naturedly, and Andromeda's head snapped up back at him, cheeks flushed with anger.

"Forgot I was a witch! Are you insinuating that I, Andromeda Black, member of the Noble and Ancient House of Black, whose family has been a prominent power in the magical world since the 1100s, forgot that I was magical and mistook myself for an ignorant, blind, dirty, simple muggle!" She stood up, left eye twitching slightly when she realized that she had to look up to him. His jovial smile collapsed into a grim line.

"Did you really just refer to muggles as dirty and simple?" His voice, cold and disgusted, dropped to low whisper. "My mum and Dad are muggles, and yes, while they have no magical 'abilities' and are ignorant of that matter, they are just as advanced and intelligent, maybe even more so, than your pureblood supremists who have locked themselves in a dark box with all of their old beliefs. And you know what," He leaned in to her, pale blue eyes burning furiously into hers. "I find that I'm not at all sorry that I made you bald." She could feel his hot breath on her face, and could only stand there with wide eyes, as he walked away, leaving her alone to contemplate exactly what happened.


End file.
